Le Niger est encore nouveau

Niger is Still New

I am amazed that Niger is still new.  We have been here almost three months and I still find each adventure outside of our compound a new one. 

I could go to San Diego, or Seattle, or Sarasota, miles away from Minnesota and if I were there for three months I would begin to feel like just one of the other people on the street.  Here, every time I venture out I am struck by the fact that it is so…………. different here.  Some of it definitely good and some not so good.  All of it is new and exciting.

The different parts that are good are getting up at 5:30 and walking in the cool mornings, seeing the orange sky, hearing first the calls for prayer from the Mosque and then the wake-up calls from the roosters next door.  At the SIL center, Monday through Friday we have prayer time.  I really like this time of prayer every day.  Anyone that wants to come is welcome.  It puts the day in a good perspective.  Then there is the morning break.  It can last for a half hour to an hour.  Here everyone comes up to the open-sided shelter on the hill to have coffee or tea and talk.  When we had been here just a couple of weeks I said to Sally that I thought they could sure make better use of the break time.  Now I’m not so sure.  Day laborers to the Director gather to break into small groups and just chat. 

I absolutely love the afternoon siesta.  The whole place shuts down.  What a great idea.  It gives you time for a needed rest and you are fresher in the afternoon.  It is hard to stay productive in this heat without it.

I like the slower pace and the admission that some things are just not that important, right now.  It is more important that I talk to you than it is that I get something done.  It is not so much “being lazy” as it is being realistic.  You don’t have to put on a show of being busy.  Either way, it is a welcomed change from our hectic American pace.  I wouldn’t change the American Way for anything but I have to say, it could “chill out” just a little and still be ok.

The bad things aren’t necessarily bad they are just different.  In San Diego, Seattle, and Sarasota I could still find a Starbucks, a McDonalds, paved streets, sidewalks, green grass, and signs.  There might be a pothole or two and in Minnesota in the winter you have the snow to contend with.  Here, there are no potholes because there is so little pavement.  What you do have is sand.  The lack of rain eventually loosens the sand so that the roads are one big sand pit, add a little or a lot of dust to that and you’ve got a sand drift you can get stuck in.  I did.

I still laugh when I see a camel on the road or a herd of goats and some sheep that found a way to look like goats.  Or a donkey cart.  How many donkey carts are you going to see today?  There are no sidewalks.  They haven’t even thought of a sidewalk.  There are no trash barrels.  Why would you need one of those when there is ground around?  If you had one then someone would have to empty it.  How silly.  So there is trash all around.

This is a bad picture but notice the goat on top of the trash container.  

Note:  The trash container has probably been there for years.

This guy has a light load.  The big camel loads will block one of two lanes on the 

JFK Bridge across the Niger River.

The world is a road.  There are no centerlines, no curbs, no stop signs, no good drivers, and no rules.  At home I worry about other cars, here I worry about hitting people and carts and bikes.  You don’t worry about dents and scratches; you worry about killing someone or some animal.  It adds a whole new dimension to driving.

This is a main road I take everyday to take Florentine, our receptionist, and her kids home

The is outside the home of a vip at the embassy.  We had Thanksgiving here.  

It is a beautiful home.

This is a shot of the road I take everyday.  The embassy home above is on the left.  The huts are the homes of people who have come in from a village looking for work.

Another thing that is different is that there is no real closure on things.  Take a simple item like a water cooler.  Here, all water coolers leak.  I didn’t know they all did when I asked to have someone fix my leaky water cooler.  They did, and it still leaks, just like all the other water coolers on the property.  They painted the bottoms of all the water coolers with rust resistant red paint.  They did this because all the water coolers are rusting out on the bottom.  They are rusting out because they all leak. 

Then there is our hot water heater.  In the hot season, October, you don’t need hot water.  But if you want to take a morning shower in December, a little warm water would help.  So I asked for someone to look at our hot water heater.  They came and fixed it.  Only it wasn’t fixed.  Then they came back and fixed it again.  Only it wasn’t fixed.  The director then got involved and bought a new hot water heater and had it installed.  It worked for a day and then no hot water.  They came back and fixed it, still, no hot water.  Two more times it was fixed.  (Meanwhile we found that if you take a shower in the afternoon the sun has heated the pipes enough for a warm shower.)  Then after three days of we’ll do it “demain” or tomorrow, yesterday, we had hot water. 

I ramble.  Needless to say, we are still engaged in life here, stimulated by it, and thinking about every day existence much more than we would be if we were at home. 

The one thing that is missing here is the people we know and love.